A Deal Among Friends For a Job on 'The View'

By JACQUES STEINBERG

Published: May 1, 2006

After emerging teary-eyed from a screening on March 28 of an HBO documentary about a cruise for gay parents and their families, Barbara Walters made a beeline for the film's star, Rosie O'Donnell.

Ms. Walters told her longtime friend Ms. O'Donnell how much she had admired the film, and then, as Ms. Walters later recalled, whispered a question in Ms. O'Donnell's ear: ''Would you ever consider coming back to television and being on 'The View'?''

Though it was a week before Katie Couric would announce her departure from ''Today'' on NBC to become the anchor of the ''CBS Evening News,'' which would in turn prompt NBC to select Meredith Vieira of ''The View'' as her replacement, Ms. Walters, an executive producer of ''The View,'' said those negotiations were well enough along that she knew she would soon have an opening for a co-host.

Nonetheless, Ms. Walters, speaking by telephone on Friday from Los Angeles, just before she and Ms. O'Donnell announced her new job on ''Daytime Emmy Awards,'' said the thought of Ms. O'Donnell's replacing Ms. Vieira had occurred to her only as she watched the film. Similarly, Ms. O'Donnell, who had her own talk show for six seasons and was a periodic guest on ''The View,'' said in a separate interview on Friday that the prospect of joining the show permanently was not something she had even daydreamed about.

But as they stood outside the screening room at HBO headquarters in Midtown Manhattan, Ms. O'Donnell did not hesitate to give an answer. ''For you, I would do anything,'' she recalled telling Ms. Walters. ''Call my agent.''

A deal -- in which Ms. O'Donnell agreed to join ''The View'' for at least a year, not only as a co-host but also in Ms. Vieira's role as moderator -- was struck in very short order, both women said. And just as Ms. Couric and Ms. Vieira are likely to make a profound impact on their new programs by virtue of their mere presence, so too is Ms. O'Donnell expected to alter the tone and chemistry of ''The View.'' Since its inception in August 1997, the cast of on-air principals -- Ms. Walters, Ms. Vieira, Star Jones Reynolds and Joy Behar -- had remained intact, other than an occasional substitution in the slot set aside for a more junior co-host, currently Elisabeth Hasselbeck.

While Ms. Vieira, 52, and Ms. O'Donnell, 44, are both outspoken, including in their criticism of the American-led invasion of Iraq, Ms. Vieira is a veteran broadcast journalist who tends to deliver her views, whether on politics or even her ''View'' cast members, with a hammer sheathed in velvet. Ms. O'Donnell, who was a stand-up comic before she was a talk show host and who now has her own blog, www.rosie.com, is more likely to wield a sledgehammer.

Both Ms. Walters and Ms. O'Donnell insisted on Friday that Ms. O'Donnell should have no difficulty adapting to an ensemble show in which it is not unusual for at least two players to try to sound off simultaneously. But they acknowledged that Ms. O'Donnell's presence and role as an on-air leader could be awkward for Ms. Jones Reynolds, whom Ms. O'Donnell has occasionally criticized, most recently in an interview on April 6 on ''Good Morning America.'' (Ms. Jones Reynolds's current contract expires this summer.)

Asked on Friday whether she was concerned that Ms. O'Donnell's arrival could prove unsettling to Ms. Jones Reynolds, Ms. Walters said, ''The only concern would be Star's.''

''Rosie will be there,'' Ms. Walters said. ''And if Star wants to continue to be there, she is welcome. Star's part of the 'View' family and will be in 'The View' as long as she wants to.''

Brad Zeifman, a publicist for Ms. Jones Reynolds, had no immediate comment.

On April 6, the day after Ms. Couric made her announcement and just hours before Ms. Vieira would make hers, Ms. O'Donnell appeared on ''Good Morning America'' in the second part of an interview that had been recorded several days earlier. At the time, Ms. O'Donnell knew that she had effectively been chosen to replace Ms. Vieira, though her interviewer, Diane Sawyer, did not, Ms. Walters said.

In the interview, which was mainly to promote HBO's ''All Aboard! Rosie's Family Cruise,'' Ms. Sawyer asked Ms. O'Donnell about Ms. Jones Reynolds. Ms. O'Donnell answered, ''An interesting woman on many levels.'' She then turned to the camera and smirked.

''I don't wish her any ill will,'' Ms. O'Donnell said, before adding: ''I just think it's very hard for everyone to participate in, you know, the illusion that she presents as her truth.''

''You mean about the weight loss?'' Ms. Sawyer interjected, in reference to the radical change of late in Ms. Jones Reynolds's appearance.

''Well,'' Ms. O'Donnell responded, ''whatever.''

Ms. O'Donnell said on Friday that her most recent take on Ms. Jones Reynolds, with whom she has sometimes sparred in guest appearances on ''The View,'' was informed by the differences in their lives. Ms. O'Donnell said that she had spent the last ''four years back in reality, away from the world of celebrity culture.'' Ms. O'Donnell was referring to the time since her talk show ended, in 2002, when she has mostly retreated from the limelight to her home in Rockland County, N.Y., where she and her partner, Kelli Carpenter, are raising four young children.

But Ms. O'Donnell quickly added that her lifelong struggle with her weight -- she told Ms. Sawyer that her goal was to stay at or below 199 pounds, but that she was not always successful -- had made her feel a kinship with Ms. Jones Reynolds.

''I understand her,'' Ms. O'Donnell said Friday. ''I have compassion for her. I don't have any vendetta against her.''

In winning a slot on ''The View,'' Ms. O'Donnell beat out many other suitors, Ms. Walters said. ''Almost every familiar name you might think of, we heard from,'' she said, ''Even my daughter called me with somebody who was a possibility.''

Ms. Walters said the long list of applicants included ''an Indian radiologist from Harvard who thought we should look in a different direction and hire her.''

In the end, though, Ms. Walters said, she and her co-executive producer, Bill Geddie, as well as Brian Frons, president of daytime television for ABC, seriously considered only Ms. O'Donnell.

''There was no search,'' Mr. Frons said. ''Barbara called and said, 'I think Rosie O'Donnell wants to do this.' ''

Part of the allure of ''The View'' for her, Ms. O'Donnell said, was that it was effectively a part-time job. The cast usually gathers to discuss the day's lineup about 90 minutes before the show is broadcast at 11 a.m. Eastern time, and it ends an hour later, leaving Ms. O'Donnell ample time to return to Rockland County to pick up her children at school.

Though she won several Emmys for her talk show in her capacity as an executive producer, Ms. O'Donnell said she was ''thrilled to not have my name above the title anymore.''